Col de la Colombière
mountain pass in France

Col de la Colombière (French pronunciation: [kɔl də la kɔlɔ̃bjɛʁ]) (elevation 1613 m) is a mountain pass in the Alps in the department of Haute-Savoie in France.
It connects Cluses in the Arve valley with Le Grand-Bornand in the Bourne valley. The road then leads further to Annecy or over Col des Aravis to the Arly valley and is situated between the Massif des Bornes to the north-west and the Chaîne des Aravis to the south-east.
The pass is not an important traffic route because there are better roads that parallel it, particularly the A40 autoroute.
Details of climb
Although the pass is not very high, it is technically difficult for cyclists.
Starting from Scionzier, the climb is 16.3 km long. Over this distance, the climb is 1108 m (an average percentage of 6.8%). The steepest section is 10.2% near the summit. From Le Grand-Bornand, the Col de la Colombière is 11.7 km long. Over this distance, the climb is 690 m (an average percentage of 5.9%).
“Col de la Colombière” enters the record as mountain pass in France. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Colombière, mountain and pass can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“Col de la Colombière” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Colombière, mountain and pass provides the most credible route into that argument.
The strongest evidence will usually combine a dated visual record with documents produced by the authority responsible for the place. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 31, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q868223. Authority coordinates are 45.992, 6.476. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1613 and 1108.
Modern boundaries and familiar names can conceal earlier jurisdictions or structures that do not align with the present site. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Col de la Colombière” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.